2018-1st Quarterly Review 2018-January through March

2018 – 1st Quarterly review January through March 2018

Ministry of Health: MoH Secretary of State, H.E. Prof Eng Huot, has signed our new Memorandum of Agreement (called “MoU”) on 30 January 2018. It covers a period of 3 years. I send you the Khmer and English versions as annex to this report. The MoH helped me to get a new Cambodian multiple-entry visa to allow me to stay and work in Cambodia for 1 year under this new 3-year MoU.

Hand-over of Prey Kabas OD in Takeo province: On demand of Prey Kabas OD and MoH-Preventive Medicine Dpt we are discussing hand-over, following the model of Kirivong and Ang Roka (March 2016).

5 new Peer Educators: During February and March 5 candidate peer educators were trained and passed the exam: 4 for Kampong Speu province and 1 for Bassac area in Chbar Ampov, at Niroth HC.

Expansion OD Bassac in Phnom Penh: With the support letter from Municipal Health Department and the new MoU, the preparation discussions with local health authorities are under way. The Referral Hospital that will get the consultation sessions is across the bridge in Chbar Ampov.

Research on Voice Messaging with Univ of Washington: We are waiting for the results of statistical analysis of the preliminary data over the period 8 August until 31 December 2017. Based on that we will decide whether to continue a bit longer with the same 35 recorded messages. That would be a no-cost-extension. The UW researcher Dr Mayuree Rao was here in December/January and visited research sites in Kampong Speu province and Phnom Penh, also in order to get ideas for a new research. A new research proposal for a new grant could be submitted around September 2018 (2nd time it got postponed with a few months). Perhaps an Advisory Committee meeting will take place end of March.

Salary payments from USD to Cambodian Riels: It made sense to change our main currency from USD to Cambodian Riels. 2018 is the first year that we pay all 31 staff employees in Riels, starting with January. Payments are done through ACLEDA Bank, internet banking. MoPoTsyo does not use cheques and does not have a petty cash so all revenue and expenses are done through bank transfers.

Higher cost: We try to select only regular suppliers that can sell us goods and services based on VAT 10% invoices. We do not reclaim the VAT that we pay. Also we have begun to pay NSSF បសស for accident and health for our employees, myself included. This means that the cost of our program has increased but we have not yet increased our revenue: there is no new research funding in 2018, so we have to finance our activities with our own revenue plus the 2 donations from our friends in Australia and Switzerland in 2018.

WING Business Account and sub accounts: To save money on cost of revenue collection and to facilitate monitoring of where our revenue is coming from, we plan to open a WING business account for USD 60 per month, with as many sub-accounts as we need.

KfW support for NCD: KfW is going to provide a budget of 8 million Euro to spend in 2018, 2019 and 2020 to increase access to NCD care for poor/vulnerable chronic NCD patients. In the budget there is no special technical assistance. It will be paid to MoH for reporting on results. In order to avoid overlap and interfere in our financing system, KfW & WB advise MoH to channel its 8 to 10 million Euro assistance for Diabetes 2018-2020 to the OD’s where MoPoTsyo is not supporting peer educator networks.

Quarterly Meeting: On 30 march 2018 we reviewed the 1st quarter of 2018 progress and adjust the plan for the rest of the year. The meeting was held with most of our salaried employees from 10.30 until 17.00 at the 3rd floor of our office. We were able to review our short term and long term objectives, and discuss problems that must be solved to improve the flow.

Hepatitis C: MSF France and MoPoTsyo agreed to start the screening among Diabetics in urban area who are member of MoPoTsyo and who are not HIV/AIDS (because NCHADS is doing that already): It will be a 2 step screening process for Hep C. First a rapid Test (Bioline) to determine seropositivity, and then a second test on whole blood (only if seropositive) to determine if the person is “viremic” i.e. with chronic Hepatitis C infectious and therefore infectious. That second test will be done at Preah Kossamak Hospital. We will get the result and have to call the patient in for appointment, registration and medical examination and then get free treatment of Hepatitis C, usually a 12 week treatment with 2 drugs.

MoPoTsyo Fee publication: In March we have begun to distribute large MoPoTsyo Posters with the fees that we charge inside the public hospitals. This is necessary to protect our system as “different” from the public service. The posters have been reviewed by all the PHD.

New laboratory machine: We bought and imported a new HumaStar 200 biochemistry analyzer from Germany for our biochemistry analysis. It is a big investment, but it will save cost.